I can't find any prior mention of this band in the forums apart from revporl including the Antemasque album in his post on the Best of 2014 thread.
For those who may be interested, Antemasque is a new band created by Omar Rodriguez-Lopez and Cedric Bixler-Zavala of The Mars Volta. I must admit that I initially paid little attention to the announcement of this new project as I had investigated Omar's and Cedric's post-TMV projects (Bosnian Rainbows and Zavalas) and was unimpressed. Recently (and I can't remember what prompted me) I decided to check out Antemasque's self-titled album and I'm really enjoying it.
Heads up - Antemasque is not The Mars Volta 2 - and it's also not At The Drive-In 2. Antemasque's songs are more conventional rock and clock in around 3-4 minutes. Given the more straight-up rock context, the music is predominantly guitar-based with some keyboards used at times. I'm not the best at describing music so here's what a review at sputnikmusic.com had to say:
"Antemasque is about as far away from The Mars Volta as you can get. With such great, catchy, accessible tracks like “Drown All Your Witches” and “50,000
Kilowatts”, you’d think these guys were making this kind of music all their lives instead of 32-minute-long prog marathons. But at the same time, Bixler-Zavala’s
voice and Rodriguez-Lopez’s guitars still manage to sound like themselves. They tame down the intricacy, while still developing a sound just obtuse enough to keep
from alienating the long-time followers. The classic rock inspiration is clear as day, usurping the throne from the massively experimental art punk. Antemasque is
unsettlingly accessible, especially coming from these veterans of spacey prog, but it’s so well-written and so well-performed that it really doesn’t matter. As the
official reunion of two of the most bizarre musicians in their class, Antemasque challenges all precognition. It’s the perfect way to go against the grain of
something already so far against-the-grain."
It seems that, for me at least, the combination of Cedric and Omar is always going to be appealing. Cedric's lyrics are nowhere near the psychedelic weirdness he
came up with for TMV but, at the same time, they are still somewhat offbeat and cryptic. Omar's guitar work is also far more conventional than on TMV songs but,
again, his approach is unusual enough that, from my perspective, the songs never sound like formulaic rock. One of my favourite aspects of the album is the
drumming by sometime TMV drummer David Elitch. His drumming is entertainingly frantic on most of the songs which helps to set Antemasques's music apart from
similar rock offerings. Cedric is credited with guitar as well as vocals, Omar plays guitar and keyboards and former TMV collaborator Flea is on bass.
Some of my favourite tracks are Providence, Drown All Your Witches and In The Lurch (at times the latter reminds me of the Umbilical Syllables section of
Cygnus....Vismund Cygnus from France The Mute).
Providence
Drown All Your Witches (non album version without percussion and bass)
In The Lurch
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